Locked in itself or open to others? Jewish exclusivism past and present. The dispute over Jewish-Samaritan

Damian Jurczak

Opole

Abstract

The article tells about the sovereignty of religious, cultural and social life of the Jews towards other nations and religions. This is probably due to the fact of religious diversity , which from the beginning, forced to the some kind of isolationism. The Jews have always respected their differences and have pounded to not be destroyed by others, and to not be absorbed by other cultures and religions. This can also explain the dispute between Jews and Samaritans, which was largely played out for the purity of faith. Nowadays those isolationist tendencies persist in some religious groups . There are also such groups, which put forward the postulate of openness and seek the ways of agreements with other religions, because all of them face another arising problem – nihilism. Rabbi David Rosen claims: “I would also add that the interreligious relations are the religious experience . We experience the presence of God over all of us, being created in God’s image. And the more one sees in another one a person similar to God, the more the God’s presence is experienced”

Keywords:

Jews, Samaritans, exclusivism, isolationism